Knights and Dragons: Origin of the Dark Prince
by devdevKat
Summary: A short story series inspired from the main antagonist in the iOS/Android game, KnD, and how he came to be.
1. Author's Note

**Author's Note** : This short story series is inspired by the main antagonist in the iOS/Android game, Knights and Dragons, in which I write about his origin and how he came to be.

It starts out with a phrase of a traditional Disney story, but I love turning simple starts into complicated ends. Along the tale, I may try and explore emotions and philosophical ideas, perhaps in a naïve way, but such is the way of an 18-year-old mind. So please, follow along and enjoy, even if you are not familiar with the game!


	2. Introduction

Once upon a time, there was a king and a queen and their very fair princess, Narya, who sat upon the thrones of their grand city, Fatam Dül. It was a wonderful city indeed, and the people were all fond of their royal rulers, co-existing together in a peaceful harmony; the peasants reaped their fertile fields, the hunters sold their freshly caught meat, and the merchants strode to and fro, selling their items of silk and pottery. It was a city that flourished, it was a city revered by its neighbors — how the royal family kept their citizens so tame, yet so free at the same time was a mystery to them. And yet there was no witchcraft involved in seducing their countrymen and countrywomen — for it was only the right amount of warmth and fear instilled in their people which kept them loyal, or so they claimed. For in a land such as this, witchcraft was deemed the wild card and therefore unstable. It was impossible to keep a land clean and free of turmoil with magic in the equation, and so because of mere caution, magic and all its sorts were banned from the kingdom.

Narya was nearing her eighteenth birthday, the day which she was to be married off to a young man of equal power or even greater, so her parents hoped. Like any young woman about to be married off to a stranger, she detested her coming of age and desperately tried to remain independent and free from a man's clutches. Day after day, her father, King Atya, had suitors from all corners of the world ride into his palace hall, bringing gifts of all kind and wetting Narya's hand with their many kisses. He thought it was only fair for his daughter to be able to choose a man, instead of being bluntly coerced into marrying someone she did not wish to. As her father looked upon her for an expression of approval, all Narya could do was hold her daintiest smile and receive each and every one of her gifts with courtesy. But inside, she was roiling with fear and frustration, which only grew as the days to her birthday grew shorter and shorter.

It was the night before her eighteenth birthday on which there was a miracle. The procession of princes from all over the lands proceeded throughout the day, her father anxious and frustrated about his daughter's obstinance on finding a suitor that she deemed suitable — he did not want to implement his reserve plan. King Atya had already made an arranged marriage for his daughter as a plan in case she would not choose one that appealed to her. For he knew that the gift of his daughter to the Sinyë kingdom would double their power, or even triple it and their relations to other royal families could strike up new alliances. And how great would that be? so he thought, twiddling his fingers and waiting for his daughter to make a choice.

Minutes ticked by, then hours, and the procession neared its end, with hundreds of gifts piled high behind her, came a prince with mysterious dark brown hair, dressed full in black and gold, contrasting with his rather pale olive skin. His eyes were twinkling with a devious mix of olive and crimson. Most others if not all, had pretty blond hair and dressings of all the bright colors of the visible spectrum, which meant this prince was truly an interesting sight to behold. His lips were coiled at one end into a half-smirk, his eyebrows raised, as if in sly amusement at the fairness of the princess of Fatam Dül.

"Malëvoír, at your service," he bowed before her and in a brisk, cool voice, "Pleased to meet you, Your Highness."

Narya, as she had done many hundred times before, raised her hand towards him. He approached, took it with his seemingly soft hands and planted a light kiss on the back of her palm. Narya grinned ever so slightly at the playful yet blank expression on his face. Something about those dark irises spoke otherwise of his sarcastic expression and mysterious clothing, however that did not quite matter at the moment.

Malëvoír stepped back and withdrew from within the folds of his obsidian-colored traveling cloak, a tiny velvet box, the color of a vivid sunset, embroidered with golden trimming along the edges, like a frozen cube of blood wrapped in dainty, tawny ribbon.

Narya looked in astonishment at the ornateness of the box. Something within, she swore she could feel it, drew her towards the hidden contents of that container.

Malëvoír beheld the box before Narya and shifted it over into her grasp, his eyes now pooling into that of a faultless pond as he looked into her face, his outwardly expression only filled with gratitude and pleasure of being so close to her. Any look of sarcasm and mystery seemed to disappear before her eyes, and he was only ever the quintessence of innocence.

Narya clutched the box to her chest and shook it ever so carefully. It was so different than the other gifts she had received from the other princes over the past month. Most came with exotic fruits and animals to be housed as pets, horses to ride on in the glorious months of summer, or jewel-encrusted artifacts worth more money than all the jewelry and decor in her already extravagant bedroom. But Malëvoír, he came with a tiny little object in comparison to the others and his face just seemed to radiate with a knowing passion. It caught her interest and admiration all at once and in a sudden. "What's inside?" She asked.

"Well why don't you look for yourself, Your Highness," Malëvoír replied, his voice gentle as can be.

Narya took it upon herself to click open the compact little box and it swung open every so slowly and revealed a glass orb — a simple glass orb with dancing purple lights, golden ribbons, and ghostly green bubbles frozen within the mass. "It's beautiful, Prince Malëvoír," Narya said, not taking her eyes off the faint violet glow emanating from within the center.

"Please, just Malëvoír will do, Your Highness," he replied, slightly bowing, pleased the princess took gracious care for his gift.

"I think I'll keep this as it is such a unique and exquisite gift, Malëvoír," Narya said, meeting his olive-red eyes with her blue. She took the box and instead of placing it on the rather large pile of gifts to her side, placed it on her throne, where it sat alone. "I do ask though, which kingdom you come from."

Malëvoír glanced just slightly at her father, residing by her side, before the mass of presents, his face betraying him just slight of nervousness. "The Kingdom of Ingolë, Your Highness."

King Atya's eyebrows shot up in sudden fury. "You are not supposed to be here," he said, a dangerous chill underlining his words. "No magic is allowed here nor are the residents of magic."

Malëvoír shrugged half-heartedly, a bead of sweat lined up against his brow.

"I would like you to leave this kingdom and city at once, or I will have you destroyed," King Atya said, a keen edge replacing the coldness in his voice from before. The palace guards standing towards the shadows of the palace hall stepped forward, their weapons pointed at Malëvoír, upon hearing their king's statement.

"Very well," Malëvoír said as coolly as he could. He dipped a nod towards the direction of Narya and stepped back down, slinging his hooded cloak back over his head and exited back down the hall of the palace.

Narya looked out towards the exiting prince, bewildered as to how serious the extent of her father's no-sorcery rule was. Someone as young as she, with the courage to purposely break her father's word, the law of her country, was daring indeed, and perhaps that was what caused her to fall in love with him — a need for someone audacious and none too purely good, as it has been filled with eighteen years of blind obedience and stale light. As the next prince in line stepped forward, smiling his most charming smile and presenting to her gold and the whatnot, she could not help but continue staring into the front end of her kingdom's palace hall, following the footsteps of Malëvoír until she could see him no more, lost in the darkness of night.


	3. Part 1

They sat before a large dinner table, the table loaded with foods and desserts of all kinds. King Atya sat at one end of the table while Narya sat at the other.

"Oh Narya, Narya," her father began, a tinge of remorse in his voice,"Please tell me you have met a man suitable for you. I really do not want to arrange a marriage for you, to someone you may not even love, but if there is truly no one you want, then that has to be."

"Actually, father," Narya began, looking down onto her plate of greens and potatoes and turkey. "I have met someone today that I would like to marry." She sounded a little unsure.

"Yes, continue dear," her father implored, asking her passively, to explain her unsureness.

"If there really is no other way out of being married, then I choose Malëvoír," Narya said.

King Atya was bewildered. He spat the wine out of his mouth in surprise equivalent to outrage. "You were raised in a craft-less kingdom, Narya. I have allowed you to choose anyone, all but that one. He wasn't even meant to be there. Don't make this any more difficult than it already is."

Narya had a look of guilt on her face, for she really did not want to enrage her father for someone she barely knew at all. However, her obstinacy on remaining independent surpassed her loyalty and piety and therefore she felt the urge to fight back. "I will marry Malëvoír or I will make the arranged marriage very _very_ difficult."

"Narya, please, don't do this. Your arrogance and selfishness will only reflect badly upon us, this family and our people" King Atya pleaded.

"All I want, father, is to remain independent," Narya replied. "Is it truly not possible to break tradition and just let me go about?"

"We have already talked about this Narya, dear," her father said as gently as he could. "It is simply not customary and we are too known of a kingdom to break tradition and get away without repercussions."

Narya's eyes blazed in frustration. "Well then I hate tradition and I hate you for not being able to do a better job caring for me."

"Narya! I have done everything in the world I possibly could to care for you, and now you are old enough to care for yourself. Stop being such a —"

"A what, father? A disappointment? A fool? A stubborn woman, just like mom?" Narya retorted. "Isn't that why you sent her away?"

"Do not speak of your mother," King Atya growled dangerously. "You will be sent into the world to do good things. Do not fight back. You'll only end up hurting yourself."

Narya scowled at her father and ran her knife deep into the block of luxurious lamb on her plate, stood up furiously, and left the room in a frenzied gait.

King Atya saw his daughter recede out of the room and rubbed his eyes tiredly. The fire still blazed ominously in the hearth as his frustration and fears continued to grow.


	4. Part 2

From the palace gardens, the servant busying himself with pruning the rose bushes could hear feminine sobs from a window high above. Narya was weeping her heart out on her feathery velvet bed. She was trying so hard to be free from loyalty and vows and all sorts of promises that could chain her down for the rest of her life. And now her age was going to take that all away and there was simply nothing she could do to stop it. She paused, poised on her bed, trying hard not to shed any more tears. She caught sight of that blood-red box which Malëvoír had given to her earlier that night. She snatched it and laying on her bed, opened it again. The crystal sphere with purples and greens and blacks ribboning within, was quite a sight to behold. The gold glitter gave off a sort of luminescence that glowed within her grasp. She inspected and studied the beauty of this ball — every little bubble of air trapped in the sphere, every twist and turn of a colored ribbon, every speck of gold dust, until soon, she found that they were all swirling within, seemingly in motion. The colors twisted and churned like serpents swimming around. Narya's eyes glowed in fascination. She wondered how this was possible, and then remembered how angrily her father reacted to him, that he was from a kingdom of magic. Could this be magic? She wouldn't know for sure, as she had never seen magic before. Perhaps it was a sleight of eye, a trick played on her mind. She was seemingly bewitched by its beauty. The greens and purples, blacks and golds continued in their elegant movement, and she noticed how with every circuit, their speed increased. After only a few moments, it was all a blur and she felt like she could make out the vague outline of a familiar face.

"You figured it out," a familiar voice resonated in her head, rampant with that tricky and perky cadence. "I'm surprised your father didn't take it away from you."

"Malëvoír?" Narya asked unsurely.

The voice seemed to echo, and she wasn't sure whether it was a loud echo that resonated within her room or if it was in her head. "It's something the kingdoms of magic use for communication. Although the one I gave you is a bit fancier is all." He chuckled.

"Well," Narya began hesitantly. "I think it's amazing."

Malëvoír seemed to return a relieved sigh. Then he asked, "Did you meet anyone today… that you liked?"

"Um, I think there was one," Narya said, staring off into the distant skies from her window high above. The tears on her face were just about dry.

"And," Malëvoír paused. "Who is it?"

Narya's cheeks went red, though she hoped he couldn't see her face through the magic orb. And then she sighed in disappointment, "I don't suppose it really matters. It's not like my father would let me marry him anyway."

"And why is that?"

"Because he's magic. And you know how my father loathes magic."

Narya saw a content smirk on his face through the orb. "What?" She asked with a sarcastic playfulness, grinning a bit herself, feeling ever so lightened within her heart, during this conversation with him. She muttered, "It's not like I want to like you."

Malëvoír's smile dissipated in an instance. "And why is that?"

"I don't know if your girls are forced to marry at my age, but that's how we do it here, and I do not want to be betrothed to a man, as they are all the same bland people," Narya explained. "If I don't choose a man to marry, then my father said he would do it for me, and I know that it will be disastrous."

Malëvoír seemed to pause in thought. "Well that's absurd. We're all free to choose whomever we want over here. Even royalty."

Narya sighed in helplessness. "Please, you are magic. That I know. If you could do something, anything, to help —"

"Narya?" King Atya's gruff voice resounded from behind her bedroom doors. "Who are you talking to?"

Narya's eyes went wide at the realization of what would happen if her father were to discover that she had been given some magic relic. He wouldn't only take it away, but he would look down upon her forever, for using and possibly even enjoying that of magic.

King Atya opened her door and stepped in, eyes searching her, covered by numerous folds and coverings of blankets on her bed, for something, anything suspicious. "I will ask you again, Narya. Who are you talking to?"

"No one, father," Narya replied, her voice straining with fear.

Her father stepped over to her side. With one quick sweep of his hand, he snatched the beautiful orb from out under her pillows.

Narya looked up angrily at her father. "Give it back, father!" She tried to reach up and grab it back, but King Atya jerked back in a reflexive motion and Narya ended up flailing onto the floor, having fallen off her bedside.

"I see you've been talking with a little someone here," King Atya mused as he turned the artifact around in his palms. The orb was still shining bright and although he could not discern who it was she was talking to, the outline of Malëvoír's face was magic enough. "I ought to lash you for something as crazy and outrageous as this! But you're my daughter and I cannot let my fury loose on you. You know, if you had just behaved yourself, perhaps I might have let you marry him, but you have proven yourself to be unreliable and disloyal."

"Very funny, father," Narya began, blinking her once-again teary eyes. "There would have been no such thing."

King Atya sighed, "You will marry whoever I say as your punishment and believe me, it won't be as bad as you think, dear. Trust me."

Narya shook her head, salt droplets dribbling from the edges of her eyes. "Please, at least let me keep my gift. It was for me after all."

"Things like this are not meant to exist here," her father said. "It has to be disposed of. You know it."

"No, stop — " Narya began, before her voice broke into heaving weeps.

King Atya left the room briskly, clutching the orb within one of his massive hands.

"You know," Malëvoír whispered from the orb. "I will come and you will all know my wrath."

"Yes, a young man with little to no experience in war. I'd like to see you try," Atya said while striding down the halls towards the waste incinerator kept deep below ground.

"You have no idea what you're up against," Malëvoír warned.

"I know exactly what I am up against."

"Then approach your kingdom, I shall," Malëvoír whispered almost playfully, as if it were a game. And with that, the orb ceased glowing and returned back to its previous state of frozen purple and green, gold and black ribbons trapped in a glass sphere.

King Atya feared for what may come, more so than he appeared to admit. He turned a corner in the palace halls and called for his lieutenant commander. "Round up all that you've got. Weapons, safety nets, shields, everything. We will need all that we have."

"What are we up against, My Lord?" King Atya's lieutenant asked.

"Someone very dangerous is coming here. He will bombard us with magic," King Atya replied.

With a widening of the eyes, perhaps in equal fear as the fear within King Atya's heart, he quickly ran off towards the soldier's quarters to ring the war bells.

Tomorrow was going to be chaos, King Atya knew, and perhaps even more, all because of his stubborn fool of a daughter. He wanted to destroy something, anything, snap the neck of a bird, shatter all the glassware in the palace, yell as loud as he could, but he knew he couldn't let his emotions get the better of him. He needed a plan, a plan that would work well against magic, and a plan did he craft.


	5. Part 3

Soldiers were stationed at every entrance into the city. The people living nearest to those gates looked about with confusion, for they haven't seen such wall reinforcement since the Wars of Órë. At each gate, north and south, archers donned in the kingdom's colors of gold and blue, lay at an intimidating order across the tops of the walls. Their bows were raised in anticipation of an equally frightening enemy. Infantry equipped in almost identical colors were in a tight military formation at the entrances too, instating a lockdown on the whole city. Their polished blades and shields reflected the somber light of a dark gray, stormy morning. And soon, the first droplet of rain landed — that was when an archer caught sight of a lone, cloaked figure approaching the northern gate.

"Halt!" The commander archer shouted, somewhat muffled by the increasing intensity of the rain. What seemed to be a light drizzle slowly shifted into that of a heavy torrent as the figure approached.

The cloaked figure, eerie in his apparent blackness, dropped down his hood and looked up at all the wetted arrows pointed at him and all the heavy blades held in hands quivering with cold and fear. "No." He stepped closer.

An arrow barely caught his toe, embedding itself in the ground right before him. He looked up at the archer who let loose his arrow. He grinned, his olive-tinted crimson eyes melting into a demonic black, covering all of his visible eyes. He raised one palm into the air, and all those who stood before him, squinted their eyes to take a look at the black steam rolling off his fingers. In a single wave of his arm, black steam trailing off his fingertips, the front line of soldiers dropped to the ground. Their life drained into a nothingness as the same black smoke oozing off his hands began to wisp off their dead backs.

"Fire!" The lead archer shouted. And the lone boy was bombarded with a flurry of arrows.

He raised his palms toward the hail of metal-tipped death, his lips curled in excitement. He hadn't had such fun in quite a while. He clenched his open hands into two fists, resulting in an explosion of black energy pouring out to create some sort of barrier before him. The arrows, upon meeting this mass of darkness, melted instantaneously. The sinister boy released his clenched hands and the mass of darkness dissipated, revealing a snarl upon the boy's lips. With a push of his arms and an eruption of black from his palms, the gate blew apart completely, sending terrified archers fifteen feet above ground to broken bones and infantry flying over twenty feet back. Uncannily ink-black smoke rose from the piles of debris and the unlucky ones who landed at a deathly position. With a sadistic joy upon his face, he walked into the city, black blackness radiating from his hands.

—-***—

Narya watched in horror from her bedroom tower window. A path was being made by who she assumed to be Malëvoír, right down the northern crosswalk, a path of smoldering black in harmony with screaming and wailing. There was another deadly explosion and pieces of housing scattered in a mad whirlwind of shrapnel, all laced in thick black tendrils. Her kingdom's army seemed to be no competition for Malëvoír, or whoever that was.

The figure stepped into a clearing, a market square a hundred yards away, below her window. His head cocked this way and that, scouting for a straight path to the castle. She saw his face from far away. He was of Malëvoír's build and height, had the same hair, but the eyes were not quite similar. It was as if there were no traces of humanity in those deadly black eyes. He turned his head her way and met her eyes with his, the vile leer on his face growing wider ever more. Narya gasped at this horror and quickly turned away, hiding from his sight. She turned back towards the window again and where he once was, he was gone; just gone from the place. She began to worry where he might be, if he would get to her somehow and do what he did to many of her people unto her.

Narya began to pace worriedly about her room. There seemed to be no more explosions and no more augmenting of the tormented cries down there. She still could barely stand not being able to help her people in this chaos. Her father had to stash her away in her room, guarded by four of his most loyal knights. She had nowhere to go and nothing to do and all she wanted to do was help her people. Her father claimed it was 'for her own safety', but what is safety if whoever that was could rip open buildings like that. She decided it was time to do something.

"Sir Tyrälden," Narya called from inside her bedroom. "I demand to be released now!"

She waited for an answer. There was none.

"Sir Tyrälden?" She asked, knocking from behind her closed door.

There were long, tortured exhales of breaths and the slumping of men to the ground, their weapons clattering on the smooth marble floor. A black ooze began to seep from under her bedroom door. Narya started backing away from her door, her face an expression of utter terror.

In a couple heartbeats, the previously lovely and intricate wooden door melted into a thick puddle of black ink. In the doorway stood a figure loosely cloaked in gold-rimmed obsidian. His eyes were demonic, his hair seemingly tossed in a great wind, and his hands radiated an eminence of fear, with solidified, rippling strands of it trailing out of her room.

"Please, stop, get away!" Narya shouted, her voice quivering with fear.

The boy smiled, his smile too wide to be human. He raised his hand at her, pulsing in blackness.

"Malëvoír, please tell me it's you and not someone else," Narya said desperately, closing her eyes in anticipation of an unfortunate death.

The boy held still his overreaching arm for just a moment. His eyebrows curved in a way that suggested remorse.

"Malëvoír, please, don't do this anymore. Whatever happened to the great person you were when I spoke to you last night?" Narya asked, trying to stabilize her voice into one of sympathy.

The boy looked down at the floor confusedly, his hands dropping to his waist as well. The streams of blackness seemed to thin ever so slightly.

"Malëvoír, it is you!" Narya exclaimed, hoping she wouldn't have to die today. She began to approach him, her hand slightly in front of her, set in tentativeness.

The boy snapped his head back towards her and let out a low growl.

Narya paused in her track, an expression of fear about to surface on her face. But she kept it beneath her physical expression and continued to approach him. Upon getting close enough to him, she reached out and touched him gently on his arm. "Malëvoír, it's me, Narya. You don't want to hurt me."

He turned his face towards her, and the blackness corrupting his eyes wholly melted away. The streams of fear and darkness ceased to flow from his hands. "Narya?" He blinked.

"Yes, yes it's me," Narya said. She held his arm with both her hands now. It seemed as if her touch calmed whatever was previously there.

Malëvoír brushed his face with his hands and rubbed at the corners of his eyes. "What did he do this time?"

"Who's he? It was you, Malëvoír. I didn't see anyone else," Narya said, looking into his beautiful olive and crimson eyes, the two colors put together in a most spectacular way, especially after whatever possessed him dissipated.

"Úvëar," Malëvoír pressed his hands to the sides of his head. "I…" he trailed off and slumped to the edge of her bed.

"What's wrong? Who's Úvëar?" Narya grasped his hands in hers, trying to comfort him.

"He's me," Malëvoír said. "He always takes over when I am angry or sad or upset."

Narya stared into the distance, deep in thought. "Here we call it a disease of the mind. When you have multiple personalities that come in during certain situations."

Malëvoír looked up at Narya, slightly confused, "How do I tell him to go away?"

Narya blinked, trying to remember what her Intellectica of the Mind taught her a year ago when she had been studying diseases and facets of the mind. "I believe the best way is to have my Intellectica talk to him."

Malëvoír's eyebrows went up in confusion, "What's an Intellectica?"

"A teacher."

Malëvoír sighed, "I don't think it's smart for your teacher to talk to Úvëar. He's dangerous. Look what he did — I did, to the north side of your city — look what he almost did to you."

Narya caressed his quivering hands just slightly, "It's not your fault. Don't your parents know about Úvëar? I mean, you guys are magic and magic is pretty much foreign in my land. They ought to know more than I do, right? Please tell me they help you with this."

Malëvoír looked into Narya's eyes, a little lost and dazed. "They know. They've tried to put Úvëar down, but he's powerful."

Narya made her most hopeful expression, "We can help get rid of Úvëar."

"Not after what I did to your city," Malëvoír said, looking out and hearing the pained cries and shouts.

"It's not your fault, Malëvoír," Narya told him.

"They won't understand. Especially your father," Malëvoír looked at her hopelessly. "And I don't know where Úvëar disappeared to, so I don't know if I can get away."

"You don't need to. They will understand. I will make sure they understand. I promise," Narya said, staring into the windows of his soul.

There was the sudden onrush of heavy footsteps and within moments, her father burst into her room, his war hammer clutched tightly in his hand. He caught sight of the cloaked, confused boy sitting beside his daughter. "Seize the monster!"

The elite palace guardsmen quickly poured forth and grabbed Malëvoír roughly and tore him away from Narya.

"Bring him to the _special_ dungeons. The monster stays until we have conversed with Ingolë," her father commanded.

"Father, it was all a terrible, terrible accident. It wasn't his fault quite at all!" Narya exclaimed, angry and upset at her father for dealing with Malëvoír so spitefully.

"Anything that spouts from his venomous is false, a lie, spun to deceive you!" King Atya shouted back at his daughter, astonished and infuriated that she would try to defend him. "Look at what he did to the north villas! Roasted and crumbled to dust and ashes! And he is just one boy — not a boy, a monster or the Devil incarnate!"

"But he's just a boy!" Narya retorted, leaning forward in defiant fury. "There is something quite wrong with his head! You don't seem to have the capacity to understand exactly what is going on!"

King Atya looked shocked to be hearing his daughter yell back at him. He spat back, "I have fought a whole war over the use of magic, politically and militarily! Believe me, residents of magic are disgusting and the only thing they bring is pestilence and destruction!"

Tears verged on her eyes and slipped down. Narya felt like crying her eyes out, but that was not what her mother would have done. Instead, she wiped away what tears which escaped the emotional confinements of her eyes and stated as calmly as she could, "I promised to him we would help him. Please let me keep my promise."

"Your promise? Who's going to help him? Your Intellectica? There is no way I am allowing that poor old man to step anywhere near that monster!"

"I am the princess of this kingdom and I demand that to be so!"

"So you are pulling out that card," King Atya observed, annoyance hinting in his voice. "I am your father and the king, so in that case my card trumps yours. I tell you what, we contact his royal family and ask them to clean up the mess he's caused and send him on his way back home. Meanwhile I will give you until this mess is all clean to decide on a magic-less partner. Now that you've seen how dangerous magic is, tell me you do not want to be with someone magical for the rest of your life."

Narya looked back at her father, his piercing blue eyes staring hers down. "That only leaves us to our previous dilemma. Father I swear I will run away!"

"You will do no such foolish thing, Narya," her father replied, at this point completely exasperated.

"I always liked mom more," Narya mumbled as she sat herself down on her bedside once again. She looked down, ready to give up the fight against her father.

King Atya chose to ignore her daughter's statement. "Then we are settled." He turned and left her bedroom, attending to injured and deceased palace guards.

Narya continued staring out into the churning and wild commotion in the streets. Suddenly, she she had an epiphanic idea — one of pure delinquency and strung up with dangers.


	6. Part 4

The night was anything but peaceful. The usual symphony of crickets during the evening that played onto the night was absent, replaced by the the shifting and moving around of debris, hammers and pickaxes resounding off broken bits of houses. Narya could not sleep at all. The fact that she had so far failed to keep her promise to Malëvoír created butterflies in her stomach and sent sweat dribbling down her forehead in cold guilt. Her body was tense, lying in her bed, her eyes wide open and staring at the frescos painted on her low-hanging bedroom ceiling. Her mind felt like the aftermath of a hurricane having torn through several port-cities. It felt numb and she could not think as clearly as she wanted to. So much had happened the past two days. A charming prince had come to visit, wreaked otherworldly disaster on her kingdom, almost killing her in the process, yet she found him to be full of intriguing phenomenons.

She turned her head slightly to the open window in her bedroom. The moon shown full and the stars were glistening bright, beautiful in stark contrast to what devastation lay underneath its horizon. Dark clouds were rolling in from the south, but they were so far far away. Surely, it would be light again way before the clouds reached her city. They seemed the least bit frightening after what she had seen this day, but dark they were and ominous did they seem.

Narya lifted herself up out of bed, slipping on her night slippers. She quickly retrieved a light cloak from her rather congested wardrobe and another one of darker color. Then she tip-toed her way down the hall and turned a corner, weaving her way through the palace corridors, lost not at all, having lived within its confines for all her life. Slowly but surely, she arrived at a branching corridor just before the entrance to the dungeons. She peeked around the corner and caught site of two guards dead asleep, slumped over on either side of the entrance. She looked more intently and discerned a ring of keys clipped to the belt of the one on the right. Looking behind herself once more to make sure she wasn't seen, she proceeded with her audacious plan. Making little to no sound at all, she carefully removed the keys and a torch set in a hold on one side of the dungeon entrance. Narya then started down the stairs.

At first the stairs seemed polished and clean, but it slowly degraded into stone slabs, sloppily positioned. The curving staircase finally ended as she came to an even floor. It smelled terribly of mildew and the stink of unwashed people. Holding the torch in front of her, she started down the corridor. She could barely hear the chittering of rats at the fringes of the dungeons. She waved the torch in front of her, illuminating huddled figures in their cells. They all seemed so miserable in their dank, dirty clothing, their skin pale from the lack of light. Narya wondered how long these people had been down here and what they had done to be sent to live down here as punishment. She remembered her father saying something about a 'special' dungeon as she continued down the corridor. The smell and darkness seemed to intensify as she continued, sending shivers down her back.

She cringed her nose upon sight of a garish red door at what seemed to be the corridor's end. Upon all her trips around the palace, even when her father brought her to the dungeons to see all the criminals when she was younger, she never remembered having seen such a sight. This must be the doorway to the so-called 'special' dungeons. Curious, Narya noticed the bolts on the door, counting what seemed like at least five. The bolts seemed to be very different than the ones she'd seen on the doors within the upper floors of the palace. They were much more intricate and encrusted with dark gems of all sorts of super saturated color. She swore she could see some faint glow emanating from their cores, but shrugged it off as nothing but tricks the darkness could be playing on her eyes. One by one, she slid open the bolts, hearing clink after clink until all of them were loose. She twisted the doorknob and pulled, the door creaking open, dangerously loud. Narya jumped at the amount of noise she had created by a simple light pull of the door. It reverberated off the slick dungeon stone, causing more shivers to run down her spine. She slid open the door a tad more, the creaking disappearing into a well-oiled silence. What lay before her was literally a room of blackness. She thought the corridor she had walked through was dark, but staring into the depths of this one, she could not make out a single thing, the light from her torch permeating no more than a few feet in front of her.

Narya entered. Where before there was the chittering of rats and the snores and muffled whispers of prisoners, here there was no noise at all and only the silence of the tenebrous gloom. She was spooked to her very core. Her whole body shaking, trembling, her instincts telling her to run as far away from this place as she could, she obstinately forced herself to continue forth. Exploring the few feet in front of her, she noticed she was in another corridor. However, it split off into two directions in several more feet. To her sides, she guessed, were steel cells completely sealed off. There was just the slightest perforation for air and the slightest outline of an openable door for all that she could discern; there was a keyhole, but there were no doorknobs or handles to open it in any way. Whoever or whatever was in the 'special' dungeons must be unimaginably dangerous, and this was only first first cell she could make out.

She wandered half-blindly down the gloomy halls, thinking she almost had gotten herself lost. She could not make out the dim light coming from behind the unlatched red door anymore, having gone deep into the darkness. Narya began sweating profusely, nervous that she had gotten lost and that her father would never see her again, no matter how much she hated him. All she wanted right now was to be back in his fatherly arms the way he would hold her when she was quite a few years younger. Getting desperate, she called out, her voice echoing eerily into the blind blackness, "Malëvoír where are you?"

Narya swore she heard just the faintest of shuffling within a sealed cage.

"Malëvoír, is that you?"

There was a dry rasp that seemed to leak out of a nearby cell. Narya travelled as quickly as she could towards that cell. Upon reaching it, she called into the small perforation. "Malëvoír?"

There was a minute shuffling from within the cell. Then a seemingly tortured voice rasped, "Please, save me. Open the door."

Narya noticed the difference in its voice. It sounded ancient and just plain horrifying. There was no way that could be her Malëvoír.

She was turning away just before the cell shook with extreme violence. Bits of stone from the low-hanging ceiling plummeted onto the ground as Narya let loose a terrified whimper, stumbling into the cold, mudded ground. Dirt clung to her nightgown, once a pale and extravagant lavender. There was a croaky spout of manic laughter from the cell after the vehement quaking stopped. The maniacal laughter sent Narya stumbling along as fast as she could down the hall, now seeking the exit. The torch light seemed to shrink the longer she stayed down in the empty darkness. "Malëvoír, where are you?" She called tentatively as she traversed in a panicked gait.

After what felt like hours, Narya caught sight of the faintest illumination from the red door still wide ajar. She exhaled and almost shed tears of terrified relief. She picked up her trailing gown and started sprinting towards it. Narya was almost upon the exit, before she heard a distant, muffled yell from a cell she had just passed. She stopped in her sprint, as the voice was somewhat familiar. "Malëvoír?"

"Narya! Narya? Is that really you?" A boyish voice cried out from within the steel cube.

Narya almost leaped in joy, but fear still ran deep through her veins. "Yes, it's me, Malëvoír. I'm so sorry I couldn't keep my promise."

Malëvoír sighed. "It's really okay, your people will never understand."

Narya didn't know what else to say, as she madly jingled through the keys, trying one after the other, until finally one clicked into place. To her surprise, the steel-grated door slid open on its own accord and revealed Malëvoír to be sitting on the hard ground, stripped down to a white sleeveless tunic and ruined brown shorts. His dark hair was slightly more oily, illuminated in the warm glow of torchlight. Whatever previous magnificence and mysteriousness that emanated from him in his Ingolan dress was completely void. If anything, he looked like any other city adolescent. Narya briskly handed him the deep, velvety cloak she had brought with her.

Malëvoír gaped at her, in half in shock and half in glad surprise, slipping the cloak on in gratitude. "You should not have done this. What will your father brand you as when he finds out?"

Narya grabbed his cold, slender hand and stole him from his cell, leading him down the dungeon corridor towards the exit. "I couldn't keep my promise. At least let me help you escape. I don't care what my father thinks. He's an old man whose mind is closed to anything his daughter wants."

They reached the red door and Narya pulled him through, shutting the door back in place and bolting it again. She sighed in relief, the primal fear in her guts finally alleviated from her body. She was still frightened — terrified, about where her choice would bring her, but she was ready for whatever consequences that lay in store for her. With her decision remaining steadfast, clear as day, in her determined mind, she lead him back towards the winding staircase up to the entrance, hoping that the guards were still asleep.


	7. Part 5

Narya exhaled in relief upon seeing that it was still very dark upon reaching the dungeon entrance. Both guards were still sound asleep. She placed the torch back into the holster on the wall and cautiously slipped the ring of keys back onto the guard's belt. She looked back at Malëvoír, still hiding in the shadows behind the dungeon gate, her eyes telling him it was okay to come out.

Together, they moved as silently as they could manage through the twists and turns of the palace corridors, with Narya expertly leading. There were a few guards making rounds in the halls, but Narya easily avoided them and Malëvoír followed her lead, entrusting his safety to her. Narya decided to take him out not through the front gates of the palace, as that was too dangerous, rather a back entrance. It was less grand, but it opened up to the gardens and Malëvoír could easily slip through the heedfully trimmed topiary walls with his svelte build.

Once they were out of earshot of any guards, Narya told Malëvoír it was safe to talk.

Malëvoír looked at her uncomfortably, having reached the palace gardens. The night skies were obscured by inky black clouds. The moonlight barely penetrated the think clouds. The unrest of the scarred city still sounded in the chilly air. "Even though you probably should not have done that, I want to thank you."

They stopped at a small opening in the tall outer hedge wall. "It's the best I could do for you," Narya said, meeting his eyes and then looking down quickly, half ashamed and half delighted to be conversing with him.

"What will happen to you, Narya, when he finds out?" Malëvoír asked, worry surfacing over his eyes.

"I don't know at all. I can only hope that I may elude him," Narya replied, toying with her hands anxiously.

"You know, I will be in trouble as well. My parents will have to deal with so much," Malëvoír contemplated aloud. "You know… I may just have reopened the war between the residents of magic and those who are not." He hung his head, completely absorbed in shame.

"We'll get through it. We have to," Narya said, touching him on his shoulder, looking into his face in reassurance.

Malëvoír returned her gaze and quickly turned away. He gave another word of thanks and was crouching to crawl through the exit before he cocked his head backwards. "Narya, there's something I want you to know."

Narya looked at his crouched shape curiously.

"That night before Úvëar took over," he started and seemed to hesitate. "I purposely called him."

Narya was bewildered for a second. "Why would you do that to yourself?"

"I wanted to show to you that I was strong by coming to help you, but I had Úvëar do the job," his voice cracked with regret. "I had no idea he was going to do what he did."

"Malëvoír you are beyond strong already; you are the most charming person I have ever come across."

Malëvoír cast a doubtful glance.

"Really, Malëvoír. This Úvëar is strong, but you are stronger, you just need to realize that."

Malëvoír's lips curled up in just the slightest, sad smile.

"Now go before my people realize you are gone."

Malëvoír gave thanks yet again and took off from the hedge wall into the city alleys, being careful to stick to the shadows until he reached the city walls and the forests beyond.

Narya turned back and taking a deep breath, trying to quell her onsetting fears, headed back to her bedchamber to catch some sleep, her guilt having resolved itself for now.


	8. Part 6

Narya dreamt that night. She tossed and turned in bed, her back damp with cold sweat. Her covers were tossed about. Not a single ray of moonlight shone through her open windows, the cold night air of the first few wee hours of the next day whipping into the room.

Narya heard laughter. Shrill, insane, cackling laughter. At moments, the laughter seemed to split into a dozen different pitches, creating a sort of echoing effect, ultimately adding to the fearful and unknowing state she was in. She could see nothing, only black, black like the dark room — the 'special' room. Then she could make out something crimson, but far too dark to be crimson. It took up her whole field of vision. She squinted, apparently not in her body and therefore could not move her limbs around in an attempt to scrabble at her surroundings. Was it the lurid carmine of that dungeon door? She looked harder and her view slowly shifted. She could see more and more of what was in front of her, as if she was moving backwards. She could make out a set of beautiful white teeth. Not even the barest tint of yellow touched the edges. Then she noticed that the dark red thing before her was a tongue. And if it were a tongue, it was grotesque and the color almost inhuman, as if one had drank ink instead of wine. Her field of vision grew wider and she saw lips, then a nose and eyes and hair and a body. It was a woman. Her irises were a hellish, unhinged shade of vermillion. The whites of her eyes were bloodshot. It doubly reflected the insanity tied into the laughter spouting from her wide-open mouth, the black tongue coiled inside like a serpent ready to snap at its prey. The lady's skin was an otherworldly shade of black. It wasn't the brown kind of black skin — it was a charcoal gray, seemingly the texture of stone, but it was alive, alive with mad hysterics. The lady's hair was chalk white, white as snow and white as her perfect teeth. It fluttered madly along in the wild wind encircling her. The wind was cold, but it felt somewhat hot at the same time.

Narya did not know how it was possible to feel the wind without having a body, but it was a dream and it felt so very vivid, almost real.

The mad woman's dress, obsidian, just like the shade of black on Malëvoír's traveling cloak, was torn at the bottom, glass and blood encrusting the edges. She was spinning around, her arms raised above her head, as if basking in this uncontrolled torrent of air. Her palms, facing skywards, were as slate-dark as her face, the light seemingly absorbed into the centers of her hands.

Her view spanned outwards ever more and what she saw was unearthly. What was fields and meadows was instead barren earth, dust-gray in hue, if it even counts as having hue, and littered with bodies. Bodies were everywhere, piled high, split into pieces; crimson blood was splattered with a fray of severed guts in a grotesque display of art. Flames, darker than a storming night, spewed from the corpses, eating what little light left there was of day, while dissolving into the air. The air, how it smelled of burning flesh, decay, and the metallic taste of blood in one's mouth. It was ruin, and there was only that one cackling, crazy-gone-mad woman spinning around in circles, enjoying herself within a ring of bodies.

Narya wanted to scream, "Out! Out! Get me out of here!" But no sound erupted into the air. She felt like she herself was positioned higher in the sky, farther away, and she urged whatever it was to get out faster. But before she could escape the sinister view of the woman, the woman met her eyes and her field of vision burst into roaring orange flames. Narya screamed. Her back was wet with the same cold sweat hugging her forehead. She jerked upright in her bed. Her sheets were tossed aside and a cold breeze hung low in her room, her window open, revealing a dim, pink dawn. She stared out, trying to take comfort in the soft shade of pink, the pink of a new day. But the peaceful shade of pink hinting at a peaceful was not to be as heartbeats later, the palace gongs sounded, deafening, in the early morning air. One, two, pause, and three. That was the call for alarm, which quickly brought memories of last night back to her. Narya heard an incoming clopping of calm boots towards her room.

"Narya," her father called.

Narya wondered what he was up to so early in the day, coming towards her room.

Her father swerved into her room, seeing her daughter, ragged and in a disturbed state.

Narya turned her head towards him, reluctantly relinquishing her view of the beautiful morning sky. "Hello, father."

"I knew you would do it," King Atya said, smirking wickedly.

Narya put on her best confused face. "I'm sorry, father, what did I do?"

"You freed the Ingolan prince, Narya. Isn't that so?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about. Are you accusing me — your own daughter, of treason?" Narya asked.

"I wish I wouldn't have to, but you brought this upon yourself," King Atya replied.

"You wouldn't be able to prove it anyway," Narya said, hoping she was careful enough nobody had followed her during the night.

"Actually, I don't need proof. You have disobeyed me and retaliated against my best efforts for you and your safety and your ability to flourish. I am sick of your insolence and I will make sure the Men and Ladies of the Royal Court think so too."

Narya was paralyzed in fear. "And how will you do that?" She asked, her voice quivering just slightly, betraying her sense of impending doom.

King Atya grinned. "I have my ways. Now, if you will walk with me down to a nice room in the palace dungeons that I have specially prepared for you, as I cannot have you running about, it will be better than if Sir Haenorím and Sir Maénoxus come take you."

Narya's mind was whirring in desperate thoughts, thoughts about her father, thoughts about Malëvoír and how he was holding up, thoughts about her dream, about her upcoming future, and even thoughts — or rather doubts, about what happened to her mother. She snapped her gaze back to her father, and putting on a displeased smile, "Of course."

They left her room together for the dungeons after Narya had changed into something more suitable and roughly combed down her hair, with Narya holding as calm a posture as she could muster.


	9. Part 7

They walked down briskly towards the palace dungeon. Narya's physical body held an elegant stance, but within, her mind was abuzz with escape and the natural-born instinct to flee. It was like all time had stopped as Narya quickly went through possibilities and no sooner, they were almost upon the entrance.

Out of the blue, Narya struck down on her father's gripping hand with a rather large sewing needle she had hidden up her sleeves as she was dressing. Her father let out a roar of pain as Narya picked up her light dress and ran as quickly as she could for her father's work room. Along the way, she took several detours and backtracked so as to lose which direction she was going as the guards were called to help catch her. Narya finally reached her father's work place. The door was rather grandiose and was laced with black metal shaped into a beautiful floral pattern which sprouted from the door hinges. She gripped the door knob and pushed hard, the door slowly creaking open for her and she saw a rather chaotic clutter of items and clothes and parchment laid everywhere. Books had fallen off the ceiling-tall shelf and were mixed into the messy fray. Narya peered back over her shoulder once more to make sure there were no approaching guards and seeing none, she slipping in and bolted the door from the inside with a stoke from her father's unlit fireplace.

Narya frantically looked for her gift, that crystal ball, and she saw it on her father's desk, resting on a stand. She picked it up, brushed it off with the hems of her dress, and snatched her father's traveling staff, which was a bit too tall for her, and heavy as well, but she could manage. Before she was about to leave the room, Narya glimpsed the edge of a painting peeking out from the top of a cluttered chest, filled to the brink with curios and trifles of all shapes and sorts. She headed over, curious, but quickly, as she was in quite a rush, and picked it up. To her surprise, it was a painting of her mother, exactly as she remembered her. Her mother was beautiful, her perfect face encompassed by fine auburn hair, dressed in a dark red gown, her neck adorned with a golden circlet encrusted with rubies. She was painted sitting upright in a majestic posture, like any other ruling lady. Narya touched the painting gently, so as not to wear the paint off.

Suddenly, the expression on her mother's face changed into surprise and the arms twitched ever so slightly. Narya gasped, almost dropping the painting. Her eyes must be playing tricks on her, but she looked closer and now, the figure in the painting was now madly waving her arms toward the top left corner of the canvas, pointing at it. Narya moved her hand and touched the top left corner. There was a brilliant flash of white light which blinded her temporarily, causing her to drop the painting and stumble back a couple feet. When the light dissipated, her mother in her gorgeous red dress was before her, in person, at the same height as she remembered her.

"Mother, is that really you?" Narya reached out to touch her mother's hand.

"Oh, my little baby Narya, how I've missed you so much!" She opened her arms to embrace her daughter. She looked upon Narya's face, studying it. "You have become so beautiful!"

Narya thanked her, and couldn't help but adore her mother's beauty, as it has been more than a decade since she last seen her, and she looked exactly the same as the last day she saw her.

"I have so much to tell you, Narya, dear," her mother said, caressing her daughter's cheeks. "Your father is a bad, bad man."

"I know, mother," Narya replied sullenly.

"I don't think you do. Have you ever wondered why there has never been an uprising in this city, even when the taxes were far too heavy and when children were recruited into the army?" Her mother asked.

"Well… no."

"Your father has ways," her mother sighed. "Unorthodox, magical ways."

"Wait — magic, you say?"

"Yes, your father has connections and is not too shoddy at it himself," her mother answered.

Narya looked down at the floor, her face aghast with shock. "But he's been against that his whole life!"

"Baby, whatever he told you is a lie. And what I told you is a lie as well," her mother said.

Narya looked back up, her eyes doubly wide.

Her mother held up her palm and a deep red fire blazed from her palms, flickering towards the ceiling. It glowed with some sort of mysterious beauty. She closed her palm and waited for her daughter to react.

"Wait — okay, so," Narya stuttered, completely bewildered, her world suddenly broken and warped. "You two are both the opposites of what you have said you were, your whole lives?"

"Yes, dear."

"So then what does that make me — " Narya began.

There was loud shuffling and voices sounding from behind the bolted door. Then there was a loud pounding on the door. Narya and her mother looked towards it, unsure the stoke would keep the door in place.

"What did you do, Narya? They seem angry," her mother asked her nervously.

"I kind of committed treason," Narya exhaled, giggling uncomfortably.

"You what—?" her mother gasped. Then she began to laugh too. "Not much a surprise, considering you are my beautiful girl."

Narya blushed, enjoying her mother's presence after over a decade of what King Atya told her was an exile. "We have to get out of here, mother."

"Ah, yes. I suppose it's time for me to get as well," her mother replied. She began waving her hands in a rhythmic, circular path in the air. "I have a way. I'm hoping that the door will hold a little longer."

The bashings on the door gradually grew louder and louder. Soon, wood began splintering off onto the floor and men's voices could be heard from the outside. The stoke was slightly crooked, bent in its effort to hold the door in place. "Mother, whatever you are doing, please hurry up."

There was a swirling circular hole in the floor, at which Narya gasped at. Her mother was waving her hands and arms calmly, her eyes closed in concentration, muttering odd-sounding words. She then moved towards her father's desk and snatched a fiery-colored feather from a bottle at which she flung into the dark, swirling hole. There was a small orange puff of dust and sparks and then she could see a small, rutted path with thick trees and foliage squeezing it on either side. "What is this place?"

"We don't have much more time before that stoke breaks. Quickly! Jump in," her mother ushered her in.

The door burst open, wood pieces scattering across the already-disorderly floor. There was King Atya at the entrance, crossbow in hand and with a large cluster of guards behind him. Narya noticed peculiar streams of icy blue drifting off from the arrow tip before her mother shoved her into the portal.

"How did you get out?" King Atya spat, raising his crossbow.

"Nice to see you too, My Belovèd," her mother said as she dropped herself into the portal.

"Stop!" There was a click of a crossbow and the arrow streaked through the room and into the closing portal.


	10. Part 8

Narya stumbled and fell onto the hard earth of the rutted path she saw, overgrown with weeds. There was a smaller laurel tree to her right and for as far down the winding path as she could see, thick, dark trees sprouted on either side. Small shrubs with insignificant flowers bloomed on the path itself and within the foliage as well. She looked up, trying to find where she came from and noticed a small opening in the fabric of space several feet in the air and she could see the ceiling and the very edges of the colossal bookshelves from the room whence she came from.

A few heartbeats later, her mother fell flat on her back, falling inelegantly out of the portal. It closed as she hit the ground. Narya noticed something protruding from her chest. "Mom?"

Her mother, stirred her breathing somewhat ragged.

"Mom, are you okay?" Narya asked, crouching before her. There was a small wooden shaft sticking out of her stomach, from where blood welled and froze in place. The skin immediately surrounding the wound was frozen like frosted glass and it seemed to be spreading rather quickly. "Oh my Gods! No, no no, this can't be happening!"

Her mother turned her head rather slightly to take one last look at her daughter. "Your father shot me with a frost-enchanted arrow," she let out a ill-fated chuckle. "I'll be completely ice within minutes and you'll have to walk away and finish what I began."

"But you just got out, mother, you cannot go out yet," Narya said, struggling to keep the welling tears from falling.

"Once the spell has begun it cannot be reversed," her mother explained, looking into the sky, acknowledging what a beautiful day it was. "I need to tell you something before I go."

Narya looked at her mother woefully, a tear streaking down her cheek. "Anything, mother."

"You come from a line of powerful sorcerers. It is your destiny to find that power and to put an end to your father's deceptive rule."

"How, mother? How?" asked Narya, more confused than ever.

"Seek the Ingolans. Their kingdom is a couple miles north from here," her mother winced in pain as the spreading ice reached the edge of her heart.

Narya remembered it was the city which Malëvoír belonged to. She hoped he made it home already.

Her mother's head shifted into a limp position, her eyes staring into nothingness. The ice had frozen her heart, stopping her blood flow and ate away at the rest of her body.

"Mother?" Narya shook her, not believing how quickly the ice had killed her. Tears streaked across her face. She shook her again, roughly, and upon seeing no movement, she wiped her damp face with her hand, wallowing in the hole which the death left upon her heart. Her mind, rattling in her head, seized sense again, and Narya vowed, "I will avenge you, mother. I swear." The only thing which really resonated angrily within her mind was blood from her father — and much more than what was inflicted from her pathetic needle maneuver, as she dragged her mother underneath the laurel tree and headed out down the path. The noon sun was beating down on her sullen shoulders, heaving with unquenchable vengeance.

Perhaps the hope of seeing her mother again and losing her at the next heartbeat was too much for poor Narya to bear, or it was the daring actions of Malëvoír which caused her to take the path she chose. But either way, her path into the future was now sealed and she could only seek its dark end.


	11. Part 9

The thick walls of Ingolë were upon Narya before her mind was clear from the ungodly weight of turmoil she had recently been through. There was a cool breeze that drafted through the air surrounding the kingdom walls, lifting some of the burning heat off her shoulders. Narya would have been intrigued by this phenomenon a day ago, but now she was no longer surprised at all the possibilities. The massive gate, much more grandiose than the two built into her kingdom walls, was empty of guards, but she suspected some sort of enchantments that served as sentries instead. Magic — so useful, and she wondered why her father pretended to be so opposed to it. Perhaps it was to keep his people under control more easily, or for a purpose more sinister than she could foresee, but either way her father was now labelled as an evil, deceptive man and the faint voice in her head only confirmed her belief.

There was a bright flash of light and sounds of small explosions from behind the gate. Narya glimpsed fire and lightning flying from the skies and aiming for something running haphazardly towards the gate. There was an even brighter flash of white light from right behind the gate and a split second later, a hole gaped in the center, rock and metal shattering on the ground. A small boy, cloaked and carrying a knapsack leapt out, narrowly dodging a bolt of lightning. He looked so very familiar.

The boy, upon reaching a safe enough distance, dusted himself off, as the attacks did not seem to chase him outside of the walls. Narya could make him out now, as he was closer to her, hiding behind a nearby bush. "Malëvoír?"

Malëvoír looked up and glanced around, not sure where the sound came from. He spotted Narya, waving her hands from behind a bush. His eyes went wide in moderate surprise, but he was indeed happy to see her.

"What in the realm happened there?" Narya asked, worried.

"Oh it's nothing really," Malëvoír tried to shrug it off, but a single look of skepticism from Narya compelled him to say otherwise. "Well, long story short, I was exiled."

It was Narya's turn for her eyes to go wide. "How did that happen?"

Malëvoír thought about shrugging the story off again, but he couldn't deny Narya what she really needed to know. Besides, he had questions for her being here as well. "Well, my parents couldn't tolerate me anymore after learning what I did. They exiled me in an effort to prevent war from happening between our kingdoms."

Narya nodded slowly. "And all that thunder and fire?"

Malëvoír blushed embarrassedly. "You weren't supposed to see that, but I ran off on some errands borrowing this and that from a few people."

"So you stole?" Narya suspected.

"Well I do prefer the word 'borrow', but I guess," he tried to laugh it off, but it didn't work. "Okay then, Narya. Not very cheery today so I see. Now tell me what you're doing here."

Narya sighed and gave him a brief recap.

"Wow. This must be a drastic life-changing event for you," Malëvoír observed. "I'm so sorry for your loss."

Narya shrugged, trying desperately to bury that memory in anger at the same time as keeping tears from welling up in her eyes again. "Well if you excuse me, I need to see your people to help me with my father's duplicity."

"No, no! Stop right there," Malëvoír said as Narya began walking towards the gate. "My people blame you for inflaming the chances of starting a war again by rescuing me. I wouldn't go."

Narya looked back at him in confusion and a look of understanding slowly emerged onto her expression. "Then where do I go to in order that I carry out my mother's dying wish?"

"We can figure it out together, Narya," Malëvoír said, motioning her to take his hand, and looking towards the unknown wilderness.

They wandered into the dense forest for hours, the day's sun slowly drifting down the horizon into a tired orange sunset. They came upon a clearing that was somewhat well-lit as the treetops gave way to the skies. There was a wide opening over the ground, shaped somewhat like a cleverly hidden cave. The two stepped into the cave and they picked up the scent of decaying meat. There was also a damp, animation scent to the cave. Narya saw scattered bones of squirrels and rabbits on the ground. There some bits of fur left in the dirt too.

"Let's make refuge here for the night," Malëvoír said, squatting down on the ground and laying out the contents of his knapsack.

Narya wasn't too sure about staying here for the night, as the smell of animal was still quite fresh to her. She looked at the contests Malëvoír had laid out. There was a translucent flask of some ink black liquid, an orb just like her gifted orb, but double in size and had stormy clouds swirling around anxiously — which looked rather extravagant, small pouches of white crumbly rocks, and small pouches of crumbly dark crimson rocks. "What are those?"

Malëvoír grinned at her question, excited to share his expertise. "This orb brings inclement weather to any place I have been to. These white pebble-like rocks are flash explosions and the dark red ones are incendiary. They burst upon impact, so don't drop them. And last but not least, the most valuable of what I grabbed — a prototype to immortality. "

Narya gasped. "Immortality? But that's only been in my wildest dreams. How is that already being looked into?"

Malëvoír grinned wider. "Welcome to the world of magic — where anything can be made real."

Narya reached to touch it, but Malëvoír quickly snapped it back.

"Careful, Narya. It's a prototype and therefore most likely highly unstable. I'm not too sure if this actually works, but it will sell for good money to the black markets."

Narya nodded in agreement. "And what does immortality involve?"

"Well, I suppose one's cells are infinitely rejuvenating, so one won't have to eat ever again, nor drink. I suppose they will live forever, or at least at least ten times as long as the normal life span."

"And should they be able to survive any injuries they obtain?" Narya asked, ideas taking root in her devastated mind.

Malëvoír sighed, thinking, "I believe so, but if there is a drink to immortality, then I suppose there is a counter to it as well. I believe a certain enchantment may disrupt the effect of this liquid immortality, but I do not know yet what it is."

Narya tried her best to muster a scheming smile.

The sun had dipped well under the horizon and there was little light left. Malëvoír suggested they scavenge for low-hanging fruits in trees and shrubs. Narya reluctantly agreed, slightly intimidated by the scary dark woods and what could be lurking in the unseen shadows.

Moments later there was a painful shriek, causing Narya to jump, chills shooting up and down her spine. There was another scared cry for help. "Malëvoír?!"

Yelling and shuffling ensued. As she neared the source of the noise, she could hear dangerous growls coming from a rather large behemoth of a beast. She flipped over some branches and saw some think-furred bear hanging onto Malëvoír's forearm as he was on the ground, struggling to free himself. He was bleeding excessively from his stomach as well, the blood pooling onto the ground. It was dark already, but the blood oozed darker. The forearm was a mess and the commotion only added to the insanity Narya had been through in the last day.

"Narya, please, help!" Malëvoír cried out to her, biting back the pain.

The rabid bear followed Malëvoír's gaze to Narya and Narya froze in fear. The bear let go of Malëvoír's arm, having lost interest and began to prowl towards Narya.

Narya whimpered and holding back a scream, she retreated towards the cave. She began running as fast as she could toward the cave after turning around and losing sight of the bear. She wasn't sure how fast the beast could lumber, but she wasn't going to risk herself.

It wasn't long before she reached the cave. She quickly grabbed a packet of rocks and turned around just as the bear pounced into the clearing. Trembling, she took a few pebbles, crumbling in her palm and hoped to the heavens that throwing it would work. The beast roared at her, causing her to jump in fright, almost dropping the stones and started towards her. Narya instinctively flung the rocks headlong into the bear and closed her eyes, the rocks working their magic, exploding in brilliant flashes of blinding white light. She opened her eyes, temporarily dazed and first heard pained whines coming from the bear. As her vision readjusted to the darkness of the night, she could see seared fur and bare patches of skin where the largest of pebbles at come into contact. The bear growled in fury and started towards Narya again. Narya threw an even larger handful of pebbles at the bear, creating an immensely flashing blast, throwing her off the ground. There was one loud roar that was shortly cut off by the sound of the blast.

When Narya came to, she could barely make out the fallen shape of the creature lying still on the ground. The forest was alive with fireflies and crickets. The sky shone bright, glittering with a myriad of stars. Something was not quite right in this wondrous harmony… Malëvoír! Narya scrambled up, with what remained of the bag of white stones and headed off to where she last saw him.

He was indeed there, lying down, eyes closed. The earth was crusted in drying blood. "Malëvoír, wake up!" She shook him.

He did not stir.

"No, I will not allow two people I care about to die today!" Narya thought aloud furiously, hauling him back towards the cave. The immortality potion had to do the trick, otherwise she might have just let grief and misfortune consume her.

She held the limp Malëvoír in her arms as she uncorked the flask, dribbling it down his throat. She didn't want to pour the whole thing down his throat, as she did remember him telling her it was an unstable formula, so she corked the flask again when half the liquid went down his throat. "Malëvoír, please live."

Malëvoír began trembling and it evolved rapidly into a spastic seizure. There were gurgling noises from his throat and some of the ink black liquid spilled form his mouth. Narya noticed his skin taking on a slate gray color. Malëvoír's eyes cracked open, his eye whites smothered in red blood vessels. He gasped and Narya could hear the shocked pain in his voice. Malëvoír continued seizing as his white slowly spread from the stems of his hair, turning his once-dark hair into one of pure white. Once the transformation was complete, his hair completely colorless, his pupils a glowing blood-orange, and his skin as dark gray as a chalkboard, the seizing stopped.

Narya gasped, looking down in horror at the transformation of Malëvoír. His wounds had completely healed without a trace of any scratch having ever been there. "Malëvoír?"

Malëvoír looked up at her and then at his hands, studying their new texture and color. "What have you done, Narya? You should have just let me die."

Narya embraced him, tearfully happy that he was not dead.

Malëvoír pushed her back. "You have no idea what you have just made me."

"I have lost my mother today, Malëvoír. I cannot lose you too, for you are all that I have left."

Malëvoír seemed to understand, but his orange eyes rolled back in his head and he fell back from his sitting position and seemed to pass out.

"Malëvoír!" Narya yelped, fearing about the extent to which the liquid in the flask was imperfect. She was about to raise him upright in her arms again, before the demonic boy swung himself upright again, almost in a robotic motion.

"Malëvoír isn't here anymore," the boy said, his voice the same, but sounding slightly more cunning, more sly.

"Wait — ," Narya began, fearing the worst. "Who are you, then?"

"Me? Why I am Úvëar, the one who ravaged the north side of your city," the wicked boy grinned in delight.


	12. Part 10

Narya started to back out of the cave, fearing for what evils he may do unto her, just as he had almost done the last time, before Malëvoír came back into control.

Úvëar waved his finger and Narya froze. She couldn't move at all. Then she found herself walking back towards Úvëar, completely against her will. She struggled to control her muscles, but she just could not. It was as if her limbs were not hers at all, but someone else's.

"You, my sweet girl, are not going anywhere," Úvëar smirked. "Now sit. We have things to do. You said you wanted my help —"

"I wanted Malëvoír's help, not yours!" Narya retorted angrily. She sat.

"Well Malëvoír died a few moments after he transformed because he was too weak to deal with the new energies he has. But me? Oh I can do so much more now!" Úvëar grinned, his orange eyes burning, his stance jittering with excitement.

"Bring him back!"

"He's dead. Like dead, dead. I can't do anything about it," Úvëar stated bluntly.

Narya began to whimper in defeat.

"No, don't do that silly princess. You said you wanted help. I can help. We can avenge your mother and I will seek reprisal upon my family as well."

Narya stopped her tears as the death of her mother sprung from her vigorous amount of recent memories. If Malëvoír was truly gone, then there could be nothing she could do. His physical body was still here along with some twisted form of his personality, which was better than the nothingness wallowing in the deathly body of her recently reunited-with mother. She didn't have anything compelling to accomplish with Malëvoír having passed, but she did have a promise to fulfill. Resolve calmed her frantic mind as she focused on her mother's dying wish — the ice that creeped over every inch of her body, her crystalline face frozen in one of beautiful agony, the last words which were uttered from her mouth. She could feel the anger again, burning like an uncontrollable fire in the pits of her stomach.

"Do you feel the anger, Narya?" Úvëar asked. "Let it burn. We will burn them all and show them who is really in control."

Narya gazed into Úvëar's fiery, hellish eyes. "Then let it burn."


	13. Part 11

About six months later, in the deadlands of Oktā, two massive, swelling armies stood at a standstill. Their leaders were rallying their soldiers, and roars of victory and bravery resounded throughout the dreadful air. War had descended upon the realm of the living, as the incident from six months before had set both the residents of magic and the regular men on edge. Since then, politics, mistrust, and fear had augmented emotions into a full-scale war.

King Atya was gleaming in his grandiose golden armor of blues and whites, raising his polished, glowing warhammer into the air, his brilliant white horse kicking into the air as his troops cheered and clamored in his uproarious speech.

King Vírin of Ingolë raised his glowing violet war staff as he galloped on his dark war elk, his obsidian-colored war cloak and shining velvet robes danced in the agitated breeze. He roared once and his sorcerers and warriors bellowed in reply.

The two armies charged towards each other, creating a massive chaotic pool of dirt-ridden men. Incendiary spells and crackling bolts of lightning littered the barren war grounds. The grunts and shouts of pain, surprise, and agony swelled into a heaving symphony of living hell.

King Atya, his warhammer enchanted with an frost rune he himself had developed, eyed King Vírin casting purple bolts of lightning and striking down an array of his men. He jabbed his horse in its ribs and the horse neighed, galloping so very fast in the direction to Vírin. King Atya cracked skulls wide open and deflected ensuing bolts of lightning and rains of fire as his horse stampeded through the chaos. Vírin noticed the incoming king and pointed his staff straight at Atya, murmuring ancient words of power. The ground erupted underneath him and collapsed, with Atya barely leaping off his doomed horse in time to escape the grinding rocks in the gaping earthly tomb below. He grimaced as his horse was crushed to bits underneath the crushing rocks. He leapt back into the chaos and charged straight for Vírin. Atya roared, anger in his voice at the death of his beloved war horse and swung his hammer at Vírin's head. Vírin's elk raised its slender, but armored hoofs into the air and battered at Atya, but the first swing was only a feint. Atya expertly twisted the hammer around and swung it back, shattering the poor beast's neck. Vírin tumbled off his mount, rolling into a graceful stop on the ground. Vírin reached from within his cloak, pulling out a lengthy rapier, pulsing red runes etched into the blade. The two charged and clashed in splashes of crimson fire and violet crackles of energy. Atya swung his hammer masterfully this way and that, parrying all incoming attacks. He saw an opening in Vírin's elegant combat rotations and swung straight for the staff in his hands, shattering it with one blow. Vírin looked aghast at his splintered staff, its pieces encrusted in ice.

"You, Atya?" Vírin smirked. "You are fighting against magic and you are a magic user yourself." He laughed. "Well, you certainly have hidden it well."

Atya smiled in reply, his hands clutched tight around the stem of the warhammer, streaming and radiating with subzero energies. He charged once again and a battle of fire and ice ensued, amplifying the corrupt beauty which war had wrought unto these lands.

Two shadowed figures materialized on the horizon of the hills surrounding the battle field. Along with them came thundering skies and howling winds, both scalding hot and bitter cold. Rain beat at the tired men engaged in the burning heat of battle, and they all seemed to slow down and wonder where this inclement weather had suddenly come from.

"Look! On the hill!" A man shouted in vain into the atmosphere, already far too crowded with ringing metal and crackling thunder.

The two figures descended, with the grounded bending underneath them, bringing them closer into the fray. They moved with impossible speed, the earth seeming to give way in their path. Within moments they were upon the very edges of the chaos. Úvëar sneered satisfyingly at the battle and spotted his father engaged in a fight with King Atya. "Look, Narya. Your father. Now do what you have sworn to do all those months ago."

Narya's eyes narrowed and she felt a surge of vengeance rush through her blood. "And you do unto yours. Now, let the fight truly begin." Narya snarled, swinging her arms upward. The earth rumbled a deep, primeval reverberation and rocks came flying upwards from the ground, a massive crack opening up down the middle of the tumult. The massive boulders and showers of dirt crashed back down, immediately ending the lives of both the soldiers of magic and normal men. Rain battered relentlessly down on both sides of the massive fight. Thunder now flashed directly overhead with searing hot wind blasting through the brutal din and frosted gales tearing through wounded soldiers.

Narya eyed her father, who had paused in battle to see her standing at the end of the enormous cleft in the earth, eying her back. She saw surprise in his eyes from her distance, but she could also see the fear — smell it even. She waved and grinned, overjoyed at dealing the excruciating death she had planned for him. The little voices in her head chittered with excitement and appraisal as she dived into the brawl with Úvëar at her back.


	14. Part 12

Narya gripped the rather thick tome in her small hands, as she sat against the cave wall, reading through the ancient text. She had been trying out a few small beginner spells in the past few days with Úvëar and to great success as well, so he had her move to studying the more complicated magical elements. After the incident, Narya had almost gotten used to the demonic being of Úvëar being close to her. It still spooked her, those glaring orange eyes, but she reassured herself that it could be worse and that she could be dead. Narya finished studying and memorizing a page full of incendiary spells that could be cast on the run. She had practiced spells in the frost element the day before and more spells surrounding the element of earth even earlier. It was incredible how quickly Narya had familiarized herself with these elements and their variations, in what would take most months. She prided herself on her capabilities, truly believing what her mother told her — that she was special and powerful.

Food was not a problem with the carcass of the bear at their disposal and plenty of fire to cook the meat. Berries were abundant in the immediate area around them. If anything, Úvëar took the disguise of a hobbling old man to sneak back into Ingolë for fresh water to drink and crisp clothing to switch into. Once in a while, they would both cast illusional spells upon themselves and wade into a public spa within the city. Sooner than later, they found themselves disguised, living in a scant neighborhood on the outer edges of the kingdom. Úvëar had taken to fixing up the immortality prototype, expertly stealing into the libraries of the inner wall and delving into scrolls and texts dealing with this matter.

Narya worked with her mastery of the elements and more in hopes of using them to defeat her father once and for all. But along with practice, she had begun hearing voices — different voices in her head that told her things, that indulged her in feelings of accomplishment. At first, she was fearful of those voices whispering in her ear, and when she turned back there would be nobody there. They told her how great she was, how wonderful she was. They made her feel over and over again the pain of her mother's loss so that she would never forget. They encouraged her, whispering to her how to do this and how to do that, as the subjects increased in difficulty of understanding. The voices seemed to guide her along the path to magic, and Narya soon grew accustomed to the voices in her head, appreciating them being there and supporting her, making sure she would stay on track for what she attributed to her mother's sake.

Meanwhile, Úvëar was hard at work, diligently working on creating a formula that would fix the problems of the prototype which Narya had given him all those weeks ago. He borrowed books with legitimate cause and heedfully analyzed the details. Soon, he was somewhat confident about the new and revised formula. He tried to test it out, however the results were inconclusive and rather unsuccessful. Úvëar seemed to give up on the work with the immortality potion for a time and instead prepared more types of explosive rock, being careful to avoid suspicion as he stole quite a chockfull of incendiary powder several times, in an attempt to multiply the power of the incendiary pebbles.

This was all in preparation for their ambitiously planned retribution. However, there was a day where Úvëar's father's voice rang loud and clear into the kingdom skies, powered by some sort of sound-magnifying conjuration. "The Kingdom of Ingolë and all its constituent sister queendoms and brother kingdoms are no longer at peace with the men and women of the magic-less kingdoms."

Úvëar looked to Narya, studying yet another long scroll covered in the messy scrawlings of some old sorcerer, waiting for a reaction.

Narya looked up, and smiled a crooked smile at the announcement. Perhaps they needn't do anything. Their parents could just fight each other to the death and they would have to do anything.

"No," a voice told Narya. "You have to do what needs to be done. It is your endgame. Not Fate's."

Narya nodded in agreement.

"Do not forget your mother's death. You would not want it to be in vain."

Narya nodded again.

Another voice, squeakier said, "Your father deserves a death just as bad."

"I'm not like that," Narya said.

"What?" Úvëar asked.

"Yes, your father does deserve to die. Make it bad. Make it brutal."

"No, go away, I'm not a murderer!" Narya said louder.

"What did I do?" Úvëar asked confusedly.

"Do it, Narya. You know you want to see him dead. You want to feel his warm blood dribbling onto your fingers."

"Holy heavens, shut up!" Narya screamed, clutching her head.

Úvëar was baffled. "Narya, please!"

The voice seemed to fade away.

Narya sighed in relief. She saw Úvëar looking at her, a bewildered expression on his face.

"Is everything okay?" He asked worriedly.

"Yes, yes," Narya said annoyedly.

But as the days went by, melding into weeks and months, the voices became louder and louder, more numerous in pitch, and harder to control. They brought on strong surges of anger and fear very often and no longer seemed to care about unseating her father from his throne. They wanted blood. They wanted death. Not just any death, but a gruesome death, and Narya desperately tried to fight the voices. Slowly but surely, she was succumbing to their malevolence and rage. She listened to them muttering her darkest thoughts into her ears, having learned it was futile to try and put them down. They only ever came back more coercing than before.

Úvëar was worried about Narya at first, though he soon seemed to enjoy her tortured state. She seemed beautiful to him, struggling in her despair. He subtly encouraged her to listen to the voices in her head telling her what to think and what to do, as sometimes Úvëar felt like he could hear their whispers too. They never talked to him, but he could hear what they said, and he liked what he heard. He had told Narya all those weeks ago during the formation of their revenge plan, that he wanted to unseat his parents as well. But she never really knew what he had in store for them. And with these voices in her head, it was almost too convenient. He could at last be open to her, once she had fully succumbed to them.

There were more and more announcements as the months passed. Narya and Úvëar relished the escalating tension between the people of magic and that of ordinary men. There came a day where Ingolë began recruiting people for an army that they would be sending into war. The days passed and Narya's condition only caused her mind and body further deterioration. Úvëar pretended to support her fight, but really hoped she would end up seeing eye to eye with the voices in her head.

The day soon came when the city sent off their children and brethren to fight for the kingdoms of magic. Mothers, children, ladies, and the elderly were crowded in the streets, waving off their beloveds and their grown children. The city was abuzz with worry and excitement. Narya joined the crowd with Úvëar and they caught site of a spectacular line of troops marching in perfect formation down the streets and to the gate.

Úvëar pointed towards the front of the line. "Look, I see my father."

Narya caught site of the blond-haired man riding on a dark elk armored in black silk and cloth, the same colors as the armor Úvëar's father was adorned with.

"If my father is going off to war, it must be really really important," Úvëar observed. "Do you think your father might be there too?"

"He is. He is. Go. You must go," the voices chittered in Narya's head.

She looked at Úvëar with a dazed sort of look. "I know he will be there. They could just end up killing themselves. It might all just work out for us without us lifting a single finger."

"But what is revenge if you cannot exact it yourself?" Úvëar asked pointedly.

"Revenge. Revenge. Revenge," the voices chanted, getting louder and louder.

"Quiet!" Narya muttered violently.

Úvëar smiled. "Don't you want blood?"

That caught Narya's attention. "What?"

"What?" Úvëar asked back.

"That's what they keep telling me. Blood, vengeance, death."

"And that's exactly what will happen. We just need to be there to make sure." Úvëar put his gnarled hand of an old man on Narya's shoulder, still wrapped up in the illusory spell.

Narya wasn't exactly sure what to do, as her mind tapered off into confusion.

"Blood. Blood. Blood," they chanted, jittering and giggling madly in excitement.

A swelling of renewed anger and pain at the death of her mother surged through her veins again, brought on by whatever spirits were haunting her mind and Narya knew. She had to kill her father herself. "Come, Úvëar, we'll be there too. Bring everything."

Úvëar smiled in diabolical merriment.


	15. Part 13

What came next was beyond unholiness. Úvëar desecrated the battleground with black fire, his eyes shrouded by a demonic black. Waves of black fire crashed onto magic-users and ordinary men. Their screams of pain were smothered in the onrush of more dark torrents of flame, all the while with thunder resounding through the air, frying men on both sides in the clash. All the while, the storm orb hidden deep in his cloak swept the men aside, blistering them with sweltering hot air and freezing them with frigid winds. Úvëar sent blast after blast into the crowd, feeling a sadistic joy in their hollers of agony.

"Narya?" King Atya shouted. "What in the world are you doing here?"

"Your daughter?" Vírin asked, his voice unnervingly calm considering the situation.

King Atya gave a brisk nod to Vírin who had all but stood there, respecting the situation Atya had with his daughter.

"Hi father," Narya said. "I don't like how you treated mother. It's about time you get what you deserve." She let loose a battle cry and bending the earth to her will, leaped high into the air, sprinkling a barrage of incendiary pebbles onto her father, her eyes burning with vengeance and anger which the voices within her head powered her with.

Atya glanced at Vírin, who only shook his head at Atya's situation, wading back into the fray. "Should've taken better care for your daughter."

Atya snarled as he parried the wave of bright orange fire, batting them away with his frost-imbued hammer. He held out the war hammer straight and a bolt of ice streaked out from the top, shattering into a wall of earth Narya had summoned.

Narya peeked out from behind the wall and grinned amusingly. "You tried to kill me with the same magic you killed mother with! How poetic." Narya leapt out, catching hold of a hot air current and sweeping it towards her father, battering him in blistering heat.

Atya grunted, having felt pain for the first time in quite awhile. "You know your mother saw a poor fate for you."

Narya's face contorted into an expression of pure hatred, pure anger. "And who are you to say things about mother?"

"Your mother was an oracle as well as a woman skilled in the arts of just about everything," Atya said, summoning a shield of icy wind around him, countering the wave of heat that had overwhelmed him for a second. "She saw darkness in you and feared for the worst. And now here I am. I was so wrong to disbelieve her. I wanted to raise you in all the good ways possible, protecting you from all things that could destroy your childish attitude. But now here you are and she's gone from me forever."

"You were the one who killed her!" Narya blamed, her voice filled with loathing.

"She foresaw that too, your mother. She saw you in her visions, the trouble you would cause, the darkness that would ensnare your mind and the doom which would fall to this realm. I blindly hated her for her visions. There was no way my beautiful daughter could become the essence of something so evil! But how wrong I was."

"But you could have let her live!" Narya shouted, furious.

"I could not afford her to kill you, Narya, for that is what she would have done. She's been trying to undermine me all our married years, and she mistakenly revealed herself in your childhood. That is why I trapped her in that painting, did whatever I could to stop her from getting to you. If you truly understand the extent to which I so care for you, Narya, please. Come back."

Narya's eyes widened in seeming realization, a tear slipping down her face, a tear of remorse and regret. But her eyes quickly snapped back to one of pure evil to her father's dismay. "But I have become great! I can be so good, more good than you have ever brought me up to be!"

"I did everything in my power to cheat Fate for you!" Atya said, his wall of icy wind faltering to his daughter's absurdly inhuman power. Wind roared in his ears, as it became harder to hear his child speak her delusional state of mind. "I want to give you another chance. I want to help you and protect you again. Come back Narya, my beautiful beautiful daughter that I have tried so hard to keep well!"

Narya's face suddenly melted into complete regret and remorse. Tears slipped from her welling eyes, no longer able to withhold them. "I'm so sorry father." She stopped hurling her relentless winds at her father and ran to him, embracing him in a hug.

Atya smiled, holding her in his arms, simply glad that she was in his presence. But his beloved wife, Apacenya, who had fought against his decisions to save Narya, riddled his mind again. How could he have been so blind? Blind to the inevitability of Fate? All these attempts to save her only to end all the same. He could feel the darkness enveloping his daughter's mind, as he embraced her. It was strong and it was evil and it had onset in so short a time. It was far too late to save her. What good was left in her was gone. "Narya, look at me."

Narya looked up to her father, her face wasted with confused.

"It's going to all be okay, Narya." Atya said to her, wrapping his hands around her neck.

"Father, what are you —"

There was a sharp snap. A tear dribbled down Atya's cheek as his daughter slumped to the ground.


	16. Part 14

Úvëar felt the absence of voices whispering in the air. He turned his head back to where he last saw Narya. He saw her father walking away from a body slumped to the ground. "No!" He pooled into a streak of black fire, traveling as fast as he could to the body, barreling through anyone in his way, dousing them and melting their skin and bones away in his black fire.

He peered over Narya's body. Her neck was at an odd angle. He shook her, but she did not stir, her eyes wide open, glazed with death. "This cannot be happening!" Úvëar, however much he wanted Narya to be like himself, cared for her, and cared for her deeply. He remembered the fixed version of the immortality potion that he had spent that last several months working on. He pulled out the flask, the liquid still an insidious ink black. His fingers shaking, her uncorked it and poured the liquid down her throat. He waited.

Suddenly, Narya's body began heaving violently, seizing, black froth foaming from her mouth.

A surge of fear enveloped Úvëar's chest, wondering if he had done something so very wrong.

Narya's neck snapped back in place with a sickening crunch and crimson blood spurted out from her mouth. Her skin however, slowly took on a monstrous shade of slate-gray. Narya's eyes flashed awake in a burst of hellish orange-red. The roots of her hair took on a white color which slowly spread across the rest of her hair. The seizing stopped. She looked up into a pair of monstrous orange eyes. "Úvëar?" Narya rasped.

"You were killed. Now you are safe and alive," Úvëar said, caressing her beautiful new face, staring at wonder, her new demonic eyes, eyes that were just like his. Her hair flowed an eerie white, white like snow freshly fallen from the heavens, hair just like his. He smiled. Though the results were still the same as before, which gave him a sense of failure, he was filled more with the sense of joyfulness now that her form was now of darkness.

Narya sprung upright, flexing her neck. She looked at her hands and grinned. "I feel great, Úvëar. Thank you."

"Of course, Narya," Úvëar said, pleased at her acceptance of her new body. "You have something to finish. That man — your father. He killed you."

Narya smiled cruelly. "Oh I know, my dear Úvëar. I'll be returning the favor." Narya ascended into the air, grasping onto a stream of hot air and shot off in her father's direction.

King Atya was hammering away at Vírin's forces. His warhammer crackled with power, freezing foe after foe, watching them smash into the ground after they were made pure ice by his hammer's touch. As he swerved around in his massive momentum, he felt a searing pain through his stomach. He grimaced in pain, his hammer falling from his grasp. He looked down and saw a hole where his stomach had once been, the edges still on embers. The pain scratched at the edges and he felt pain rack his gut. He looked behind and saw a demonic being in the same dress as her daughter. "Narya?" He gasped as he collapsed onto the ground.

"Yes, father. I'm here to return the favor."

"Why?" He asked hoarsely, looking up into her infernal eyes, reaching for her dress.

Narya sneered.

The last thing Atya saw was a torrent of black fire oozing across his vision, bellowing in unholy agony.

Narya looked at her handiwork. All that remained of her father was a charred skeleton half melded into the earth. She looked up at the rest of the chaos. She caught site of Úvëar standing over his own dead father. Now, most of the troops were either dead, injured or desperately trying to flee, their leaders having been killed. "This transformation feels great," Narya said, summoning columns of black fire to erupt from the earth, catching several soldiers fleeing by surprise, ending in their screams of pain. She laughed, relishing their deaths.

Úvëar had come to her aid, utterly destroying anyone and everyone in his wake. Black fire desecrated the land across the battlefield. The storm raged full in power, the lightning and thunder that rained down upon the stragglers were now corrupt, black in color, as if the very opposite of light itself. And then, everything was calm. No more shouts or screams or anything moving, only black streams of smoke drifting from burnt corpses and a large rupture in the middle of the battlefield filled with men having fallen to their doom. The storm raged on and it seemed to add to the calm in some odd way.

Úvëar floated back down to Narya's side, having caught the last fleeing soldier, dropping him into the depths of the rend in the ground. She was jumping around, leaping in joy at the aftermath of her powers. Her dark dress fluttered in the air, torn in some areas as she spun round and round in a ballet-like movement, relishing in her defilement of this battlefield. She laughed while she leapt and jumped and twirled, basking in the glory of her power and the gift her mother said she had. Her mother… she was avenged and Atya was dead. There was no more need to feel pang and sorrow, only joy in her achievement. She looked forward to more guidance from the roaring cheers of the voices in her head, to bring purpose to whatever she attempts next. She stopped momentarily her coldly beautiful gyrating among skeletons and burnt corpses to give Úvëar a satisfied grin, her orange eyes pulsing.

He smiled at her, his lips curved upwards, immersed in malevolence. "Well that was quite fun."

Suddenly Narya gasped, dropping to her knees and clutching her stomach. Chills erupted from her abdomen. She tore away at her dress to find a rapidly growing area of ice. She cried in fear as she tried to tear at it, only causing frozen pieces of skin and blood to fall out. "Help me, Úvëar!"

Úvëar looked at the spreading ice, his face aghast. After all that they had demonstrated, this was the outcome. "I don't know what to do. This shouldn't be happening, you can't die."

Narya's face was an expression of complete horridness, in total disbelief that anything like this could be happening. "What do we do? Quick." Narya smashed incendiary stones into her side, only to have the fire lick painfully at her stony flesh, which slowly healed, but the ice kept growing.

"Enchanted ice. Your father." Úvëar figured.

How could it be? Her father was dead. Perhaps the hammer had skimmed her or he cast some sort of failsafe spell on her. But either way she was dying and needed to think fast. "Quick, find the warhammer Úvëar. Maybe we can reverse the effect with his weapon somehow," Narya groaned in pain, the ice crawling closer and closer to her heart.

Úvëar leapt into the air, scanning the ground for the ice-imbued warhammer. By the time he reached Narya, the icy hammer in his hand, she was long dead, completely ice, flesh and bone alike. He stared in horror at her lifeless state. She made a beautiful statue, but she was worth so much more alive than dead. A black tear slipped from his eye as he laid his slate-gray hand on her icy hand, staring into the depths of her blank frosted eyes. He felt the statue trembling and taking his hand off, Narya crumbled into snow and dust. Regret and hopelessness clawed at his heart. And when his heart couldn't take it any longer, that pain metamorphosed into anger — hatred, pure depraving hatred. "I swear to you, Narya. From the beginning to the ends of this realm, I will burn and melt all. I will desecrate the earth from here on out and I will banish the light and all that is _evil_ in this realm so that you may be avenged. I swear it." He took one last tearful gaze at the crumbled snow which Narya had become and took off into the air, streams of darkness erupting from his body as the storm only became larger, angrier. The light seemed to vanish wherever he went and indeed did he go about trying to fulfill his promise to Narya.


	17. Afterword

Years went by. Then decades. And then even more. And soon enough, the realm he had once cherished, once loved and lived in, was completely gone, cities ruptured into dust, people burned to death with an undying rage. Nothing was left but for lands completely black, charred by macabre fire full of hate and fury and unconquerable darkness.

Then, only then, did he realize that all was for nought, and in a world now strewn with darkness and chaos, did he create order, attempting to make amends for his devilish deeds. He tried to create creatures of light, creatures of beauty, creatures with the fabrics of their soul attached to the strands of nature. But decades upon decades of darkness rendered his attempts for nought. Endless amounts of power and energy were spent to create failed beings of light, always corrupted by a touch of darkness in their hearts.

But finally, the dabbling in the arts of light stripped away his immortality — it counteracted against the darkness in his heart that weaved a protective veil over his aged soul. Slowly, he withered down to a graying corpse, nothing left but the faintest trace of a cheated life. Before he fully dissolved into ashes, he folded and weaved a last egg, pure white and holy in appearance, small and untouched by darkness, fragile in physicality. And as his hair fell away into the black earth of the barren realm, and as his skin drifted away on the frigid winds, his bones dissolving into the sands of time, did he hope the egg survive long enough to repopulate this cruel, dark world, bringing hope and light back from an ocean of death and war.


End file.
